NYPD officer shot in the head dies of injuries

NYPD officers search for the weapon used to shoot New York City plainclothes police officer Brian Moore at the Queens Village, in New York May 3, 2015. (Reuters/Eduardo Munoz) / Reuters

New York Police Department Officer Brian Moore has died after a suspect shot him in the head and chest in the borough of Queens. An ex-con accused of the shooting will likely face a murder charge in the incident. The suspect was already in custody.

Moore was driving an unmarked car and was in plainclothes on
Saturday evening with a group of anti-crime officers in Queens
Village when he was shot. Police identified the shooter as
Demetrius Blackwell, a 35-year-old self-described
“hell-raiser” with a lengthy rap sheet, who was arrested
90 minutes after Moore was injured, the New York Daily News
reported.

“This was nothing more and nothing less than a cold-blooded
attempt at an assassination of New York’s finest,” Assistant
District Attorney Peter McCormack said at Blackwell’s arraignment
and prior to Officer Moore’s death.

Moore and his patrol partner Erik Jansen ‒ who was also in
plainclothes ‒ approached Blackwell after seeing him tugging at
his waistband, McCormack said. Moore identified himself as a
police officer and asked, “Do you have something in your
waistband?”

“Yeah, I got something,” Blackwell responded, before
pulling out a gun and firing two or three shots into the
officers’ car, the New York Daily News reported.